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Sunday, March 25, 2012

SCOTUS: Sixth Amendment applies to plea bargains

Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in two cases out of Missouri and Michigan that the right to effective counsel guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment applies to plea bargains as well trials.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, also wrote that plea bargain counsel has a
duty to communicate all formal and favorable prosecution offers to the accused.
If he or she does not, the defendant may be able to appeal any subsequent
punishment, reported Reuters.

The two cases — Missouri v. Frye and Lafler v. Cooper —
deal with slightly different yet connected issues. In Frye, counsel
failed to communicate a highly beneficial offer to the defendant. He was then
convicted and sentenced to three years behind bars. The defendant appealed his
conviction, arguing that he had ineffective plea bargain counsel.

Five of the nine justices agreed that such a claim is possible. But in order
to be successful, the defendant must show that there is a reasonable probability
that he would have accepted the deal had he known about it, and that the plea
would have been presented to and accepted by the court.

Cooper differs in that the defendant rejected a plea offer on the
advice of counsel. This, too, can lead to a successful ineffective assistance of
counsel claim. However, successful claims require a showing that prosecutors
would have presented the deal to the court; that the court would have accepted
the terms of the deal; and that the offer’s terms would have been less severe
than the sentence imposed.
According to Reuters, these rulings have the potential to turn the criminal justice system on its
head. Approximately 95% of all criminal cases end in plea bargains. The number of potential
ineffective assistance of plea bargain counsel claims is enormous and it will be difficult to sort real claims from those filed by disgruntled claiments who were convicted after knowingly rejecting a plea offer.

About Matt

An analysis of crime and punishment from the perspective of a former prosecutor and current criminal justice practitioner.
The views expressed on this blog are solely those of the author and do not reflect the opinions or postions of any county, state or federal agency.